Category Archives: Cookstown

A Moortown spinster maintains she has a solid case to take against Clubland in Cookstown after claiming that the smoke machine they used during the slow dances made it impossible for potential suitors to see her all done up.

Hillary McClintock (53) is hoping to claim up to £10’000 in damages after she failed to get one curt over a four-year period despite attending the disco for over 200 consecutive weeks and twice one week over Christmas. Her barrister maintains that he has evidence that the smoke machine made it much harder for Hillary to show off her rugged loughshore looks, even during Bryan Adams slow songs.

“My client even wore figure-hugging dungarees which we all know are irresistible to lads from Clonoe and Brackaville. It doesn’t make any sense. My sister who had two eyes heading in different directions met her future husband during a Wet Wet Wet song even with the smoke coming down. Not sure if I’ve just ruined my own argument there.”

McClintock has yet to say how the £10’000 was arrived at but is confident she will at least get a voucher of some sort, even though the Pink Pussycat nightclub doesn’t exist any more.

Meanwhile, scientists in Queen’s University in Belfast have revealed that the most likely song to get a partner at a Cookstown disco during the 1990s was Cotton Eye Joe.

Calls for stiffer GCSEs have more than trebled today after the first cohort of students studying ‘Acting The Lig’ all passed with A* grades.

The new Acting The Lig course, which saw two practical exams where pupils had to stand in the corner of the The Square in Stewartstown lighting illegal French crackers and giving passers-by the fingers whilst sipping from small bottles of Buckfast, will offer students the chance now to head off to other towns now to gaunch about in style.

Despite their success, the general public have asked questions as to the appropriate difficulty of such courses. Padraig Logan, who passed an O Level in 1977 in ‘Cement Mixing’ maintains today’s generation aren’t really tested:

“Acting the lig in the 1970s was much more difficult back then. We were goading men with rifles and tacklin women from Lissan. These days a lig just gives the middle finger to oul women driving cars. Where’s the danger in that?”

Examination board CCEA have defended the course, adding that the question papers were set by some of the biggest ligs in the country, including several MLAs. One such question asked pupils ‘What is the best way to greet someone from Cookstown who may have mistakenly strayed from their ghetto?’ The two points were award if a candidate referred to ‘threatening to kick their bollocks in’.

A leaked itinerary of homecoming parades if England win the World Cup has revealed that one of their first stops on the way home from Russia will be the Main Street in Cookstown.

25 years after Derry pulled the same stunt without warning after winning the All-Ireland, dentists are worried about a repeat of 1993 after they were pushed to breaking point with so many gritted teeth injuries.

Cookstown Head of Festivities Joshua Sheehy admitted they weren’t surprised at the news:

“England would be well aware of what Derry did in 1993 in Cookstown and how it mentally affected Tyronies for decades. Squints, broken teeth and a rise in cursing have been the classic side-effects to this day from seeing Brolly and Tohill blow kisses to Cookstown ones. For England to parade up the street will finish many off for good.”

The document also revealed that, if successful, the England bus will stop off at the Maxol station beside the Cohannon Inn after the Cookstown parade and will probably order cowboy suppers from PG Chips although Harry Kane just wants a sausage supper as the beans gives him wind.

Meanwhile, Omagh officials are considering erecting a big screen at Healy Park if the visit of Dublin coincides with the World Cup final if England make it. The screen will not show the game but simply be used to warn spectators not to turn on the radio or TV if Southgate’s men win, for three months.

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Thousands of Tyrone boat-owners were said to be ‘seething’ today after it emerged yesterday that they are not allowed to wash their boats as one of the conditions of the hosepipe ban.

Over 80% of households in Tyrone are said to own a boat due to their proximity to Lough Neagh and Fermanagh waterways as well as multiple appearances on the 1980s gameshow ‘Bullseye’, winning speedboats in the process.

Several arrests were made in Ardboe this morning after dozens of families attempted to get around the ban by using buckets instead of hoses.

Jamesy Forbes, who owns three boats (one for legal activities, one for illegal and the other one for romantic excursions won on Bullseye in 1988), fumed:

“This is some form of dictatorship. There’s no better feeling than washing your boat after Mass on a Sunday and getting the whole family involved. If you flew a drone over East Tyrone on a Sunday around 12pm you’d see 1000s out polishing their boats in public. Now that has been taken away. It’s like losing a leg.”

The hosepipe ban comes as the current spell of hot weather is set to continue for the foreseeable future. Authorities have warned boat owners that they’ll be watching for people washing their boats on the lough using lough water as that is prohibited too.

Meanwhile a man was beaten in a shop in Cookstown for saying ‘God it’s warm’ for the 12th day in a row.

A junior DUP party member from Cookstown, who hasn’t been at his desk for over a week, has finally revealed that he has been disciplined after mobile phone footage showed him tapping his foot and smirking to Ireland’s Eurovision song which celebrated same-sex relationships, on a Sunday.

Wilbert McFettridge (22) claims he hasn’t been told which aspect of his party’s principles he had violated but has vowed to be a better DUP man in the future:

“I haven’t been informed yet if it was the fact that I was toe-tapping to an Irish entry, or that the song was about a love story between two men or finally if it was the fact that I did all this on a Sunday that I have been suspended for. I didn’t know I was smirking but I was probably thinking of a good joke or something.”

McFetridge wanted to confirm to his supporters and voters that he has spent the last week listening to the Moygashel Loyalist Flute Band Greatest Hits CD non-stop in his car even since his lapse and will be more aware of his musical preferences in future:

“To be honest I wasn’t aware of anyone filming me. I just happened to be listening to it whilst waiting in traffic to get into the Cookstown Fr Rock’s game against Greencastle. Damn it, I mean Sunday Service,”

The DUP now are currently monitoring CCTV footage of cars arriving at the Cookstown GAA ground that Sunday. If spotted, McFetridge could be up on all four accounts of breaching party ethos.

Despite rumours to the contrary, a pair of socks given as a Christmas present to a father of four just outside Omagh are still in operation despite approaching the end of January.

Retailers in the county confirmed that over 6900 pairs of socks were bought in the county in the run up to the festive period. It was thought that only 3450 single socks remained after the 25th of January until a man was spotted, and eventually approached, in the Spar in Tattyreagh wearing a matching pair of Game of Thrones socks.

John McCabe, who was out buying wheaten bread and a packet of Fruit Pastilles, admitted:

“It’s a pure fluke. I thought one of them was an A-Team one I’ve had since 1986 but it does now appear that I have two of the same kind. Who’d have thought that? I’m urging other men not to give up hope.”

Meanwhile, a survey has revealed that the long month after Christmas has left many families eating things at the back of their cupboards despite warning from health officials. A mother in Cookstown this morning admitted to friends in the hairdressers that she fed the whole family pickled cockles from a small jar for dinner all week.

Documents found in the attic of a house in Brackaville have suggested that Joe Brolly has been a Sir since 1993, according to a Brackaville club committee man who bought the new abode at an auction in Cookstown.

The piece of paper, written to Brolly by Anthony Tohill in early 1994, is now on show behind a glass case in the clubrooms despite Conor Grimes asking for it to be put into a filing cabinet.

Basil Gillis remarked:

“It’s quite obvious that Tohill was in on this. He started the letter ‘Dear Joe Brolly sir, ……’ and uses ‘sir’ loads of times in many sentences. It’s clear that Tohill didn’t know where to put the ‘sir’ with him being from Swatragh and all but it’s there in black and white.”

Although Gillis is unwilling to publish his findings yet, he is convinced that most of the Derry 1993 All-Ireland winning team were knighted after he stumbled upon a 20-year reunion video and most of them were calling each other ‘sir’ all night although it sounded more like ‘sur’.

“I’m just not surprised at all. I’ve seen a few of them Derry lads walking straight into restaurants or chippies and getting served straight away which we all know is a perk of being knighted by the Queen of England.”

Tyrone Tribulations can confirm that they overheard a sideline meeting between Damien Cassidy and Damien Barton at a Tyrone club match last year and they both addressed each other with the moniker ‘sir’, albeit at the end of the sentences.

In a move which no one saw coming, US president Donald Trump tonight announced that the long-lasting issue of Ballinderry’s geographical location is settled on their side of the Atlantic at least.

The small-handed leader assured his people that Ballinderry was, in fact, in Tyrone and that any titles Ballinderry won in the past are now on the Tyrone club roll of honour.

Within minutes, Ballinderryites were on the bridge attempting to burn it to stop any Tyronians getting across and laying claim to land, businesses and women. Local historian and Derry fanatic Henry McGuckian fumed:

“That orange-faced bollocks. We’re no more Tyrone than we are Icelandic. He doesn’t know what he has done here. Themuns from Moortown and Ardboe may sleep with one eye open this weekend. We’ll not go down easy, not like a Tyrone club team in Ulster.”

Trump’s unexpected declaration is now seen as an opening shot in a US war on south Derry after they refused to allow Toome to be used as a stop-over military airforce refill centre.

Meanwhile, an elderly care home in Cookstown had all its computers removed after an 88-year old pensioner was caught Googlng ‘dirty oul wemen’.

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In what is now being labeled as a ‘lone wolf initiative’, Stewartstown have already begun the process of leaving Europe, inspired by the recent Catalonian vote as well as all the talk about Brexit, according to a shop-owner in the town.

A series of meetings for ‘Stexit’ have already been scheduled for next week, including what to call the new independent state, currency and passport issues.

Randy Gillis, who has run the only sweet shop in the town since 1922, admitted he’s excited about the venture:

“We have always felt different to everyone else. We’d see the Tullyhogue and Cookstown ones driving through our town and you’d get an urge to fire stones at them because of their strange accent and eyes. Sometimes we have showered them with rocks. It’s a weird feeling. This is exciting news.”

Early frontrunners for the new name includes The Independent Republic of Tintown and Stewstin.

Coagh have reacted to the news by banning all sellers of tickets for Stewartstown GAA or the newly formed Stewartstown Triangle Band, the first triangle band in Europe.

After receiving advice on how to deal with the decimation of her tomatoes this summer, a Cookstown woman has stumbled upon the unlikely source of her problem by setting up cider traps at night.

Convinced that slugs and snails were devouring her legendary vegetables, a local gardening expert advised Mary McNally to trap the shelled gastropods by using small doses of cider inside bottle tops. It was only when she heard a rustling outside one night that she caught the culprit:

“It was the husband all along. He’d put the gardener up to saying to me about the cider so he could go out and get sloshed in the garden whilst I slept. I looked out one night and there he was, off his head drinking the cider from the bottle tops, singing rebel songs, and, to top it all off, eating the snails himself as well as the tomatoes.”

John McNally admitted to the cider/snail/tomato consumption when caught red-handed and has since added SatNav to his phone so that his wife knows where he is at any given time of the night.

NcNally also denies any wrongdoing in the poor carrot crop this year in his garden despite his wife, suspiciously now, again being told by the same expert gardener to leave beer and dirty magazines beside the carrots to ward off bats and badgers.

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Supermarkets and off-licenses across the county have confirmed a sharp spike in wine purchased by parents between the ages of 25 and 50 over the weekend.

Consumer experts immediately explained the phenomenon as nothing unusual, linking the annual trend at this time of the year to the start of school holidays, adding that vineyards in France and Chile intentionally increase their production rate for women at this time of the year from Tyrone, as well as in Derry, Fermanagh and Armagh. Additionally, a group of stay-at-home-fathers have formed a counselling group in Cookstown to counter the summer trauma.

One woman, who wished to remain anonymous, told us as she exited Tesco in Dungannon with over 30 bottles of savignon blanc:

“It’s completely medicinal. There’s only so many times you can tell them to stick on Frozen before you go a bit mad, like. A glass at 12pm eases the strain somewhat. By 4pm they can draw all over the walls for all I care or even notice.”

Businesses have also started to notice a rise in productivity as parents appear to be prepared to do any amount of over time, even free of charge. Many workers have also decided to forego their own transport and have taken to walking home from work, sometimes not returning until late evening after walking up to 15 miles.

Coalisland businessman Leo Keown added:

“It’s a pure lethal time of the year. Parents of young children are mad for the overtime and I’m paying them buck all. And they’re at the gates at 6am too. Long live the summer holidays.”

Meanwhile, a group of men in Brocagh have been arrested after trying to hack into the local primary school’s website and changing the calendar dates, creating a 31st July ‘Back to School’ deadline. One of the arrested claimed he was delighted to be caught and ‘hopefully jailed for a few weeks’.

Despite being cheered on by the entire county during a magnificent run to the All Ireland Final, the threat to the county players is now placed at ‘critical’ as they prepare to head back to their clubs for league football.

As the multi-award winning squad from the 00s can testify, there appears to be a strong correlation between playing well for the county and getting the lining kicked out of you in club games, by the same boys who clapped and roared you on a week earlier.

An All-Star winning forward who wishes to remain anonymous, said from his Cookstown home:

“The feeling of elation when you scored a clinker in Croke Park would soon turn to dread when it dawned on you that some failed corner back from Ardboe is probably going to break you in two at the weekend for scoring it. I remember I nailed one such goal against Dublin, involving dummies, and spotted a boy from Kildress cheering and giving me the thumbs up in the Canal End. Then, in a millisecond, he did the throat-slicing movement and gave me the fingers.”

With Tyrone having so many 5-star performers throughout the year, the threat level has been raised from the normal ‘high’ to ‘critical’ with referees made aware of the need to be extra-vigilant over the next few weeks.

A Trillick sharpshooter who didn’t even get on for most of the year told us he’s ‘dunging the togs’ in anticipation of taking on Urney in a week’s time. Urney, who are famed for their particular distaste of Donegal, have promised to tone down the comeuppance for Tyrone heroes playing for Trillick, but refused to make promises.

As Tyrone GAA great Joe McMahon brought down the curtain on his 13-year county career, his beard delivered an unexpected twist with the news that it has declared to play on for another few years, with or without its owner.

McMahon’s beard, who came to prominence during the successful 2008 campaign, is said to be considering its options and may move onto someone like Mark Bradley or Darren McCurry. In a scathing press release, it confirmed that its relationship with McMahon had been strained for years:

“I’m glad he has called it a day. Sure what’s the point of wintering well only to be put through a slogging session every spring. And anyway, I wouldn’t mind teaming up with someone who knows where the posts are. Me and Mark Bradley would be deadly, like something from Game of Thrones.”

The beard appears to be hurting over the lack of consultation in McMahon’s decision to retire, citing the fact that his brother Justin used to treat his beard to spa weekends and long combing sessions.

“All I get is leftover crisps and the odd bit of drink. I made that man. No one had heard of Joe McMahon til that day we beat the Dubs in the rain in ’08 and he appeared in the papers the next day with me dazzling on his chops. And this is what I get.”

Owen Mulligan’s beard has offered counseling to McMahon’s beard after Mulligan’s beard went off the rails post-retirement and was jailed due to an altercation in a casino in Las Vegas in 2014.

A Cookstown entrepreneur who was caught in Malaga Airport with a large bag of home-grown potatoes with sunglasses on them in his suitcase is facing up to three years in prison after breaking the Marketing of Potatoes Act (1964) and assaulting a Spanish officer.

The Act, which states that a constable may seize and may detain in custody any potatoes which are being or which are suspected by such an officer or constable of being, sent out of Northern Ireland, hasn’t been used since the great Cappagh Spud Scandal in 1966.

Seamus Sheehey, who admitted to planning to set up a stall on a beach in the south of Spain to sell his 300 potatoes, maintains the heavy-handedness of the Spanish police led him to head-butting one of them and running off, shouting ‘leave my spuds alone yiz bastids’, according to startled onlookers.

“How was I to know about that law? I just remembered how last year I was lying on a beach in Benalmadena and thinking ‘jaysus I’ve love a good spud now’ and the sweat beating off us. I’m sure others felt the same. But there was no need for the Spanish police to start rummaging through my suitcase and throwing my potatoes all over the place, wrecking their sunglasses disguise. It was intimidation.”

Sheehey was already facing community service as well as a ban on being anywhere near a potato field before he headbutted the Spanish officer.

The case brought back memories of the Cappagh Spud Scandal when three Cappagh men were caught at Dun Laoghaire with over 20 tonnes of Tyrone potatoes painted in different colours to resemble large marbles, bound for England.

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Following a surge in the popularity of cow-dung art in mid-Ulster, the Department of Arts and Entertainment has given the go-ahead for a state of the art gallery beside the Garvaghey pitches to showcase the best of what Tyrone have to offer in this discipline.

Cow-dung art, also known as An Pictiur Shoite in Irish, dates back to the time of St Patrick when a group of poor women, in an area of what is now known as Cookstown, offered St Patrick some dung-art in appreciation for the great Masses he said when passing through.

In recent weeks, cow-dung art has experienced something of a resurgence in the county after a 62-year-old posted an Instagram picture he created of his wife in a bikini using only the fresh dung of his own cattle.

Gerry McGarrity, who boasts over 500 drawings he created using only local produce and his fingers, said the centre could draw millions of tourists to Tyrone in the same way as the Louvre in Paris:

“There’s a big market for cow-dung art across the globe. It is a form of 3D art as you can smell the pictures as well as look at them. In my opinion it’s £4.5m of tax-payers money well spent. Think of the chip van or potato stall potential outside the building too, bringing more money to the local community.”

Early brochures suggest that the picture of McGarrity’s wife in the bikini will be the ‘Mona Lisa’ flagship display for the cow-dung arts centre and will be called ‘McGarrity’s Wife In A Bikini’.

Another huge political scandal is due to break out in East Tyrone concerning dogs belonging to Catholic owners receiving DLA.

In many cases the dogs are using mobility scooters and many can be seen in the predominately Republican town of Coalisland. A Protestant man with two clubbed feet complained to his local MLA Sandra Overtheedge that he has been applying for DLA for years and has been repeatedly refused the payment.

The Newmills man, who does not wish to be named, stated

“Them Fenians in the ‘Island get everthing goin. Now that the feckin dogs are getting DLA, it is the last straw “

A local Protestant dog breeder has also complained bitterly. Pam Shiver, who has three ex-Cruft champion dogs nearing retirement age, said they can barely bark never mind walk

“Them wee critters could be doin with a bit of help in their senior years. Some of them Fenian dogs are two to three years old and don’t need mobility payments.”

The reporter from Tyrone Tribulations, who saw the three Crufts dogs in a shed lying near three huge boilers, maintains it was boiling hot in the shed, almost unbearably so:

“It was roastin hot like,” he said, “either they couldn’t walk or didn’t want to leave the hate”.

The local Sinn Fein MLA couldn’t be contacted at the time. Their Coalisland office worker said she was on the rip since the election, maybe in Donegal, and added:

“Ah sure she’ll turn up at some stage.”

We contacted another Sinn Finn MLA from west of the county who stated bluntly:

“Sure we now live in a culture of entitlement and equality and dogs are as entitled to DLA as much as humans”

When pressed on the point about the religious make up of the successful applicants, he stated:

“Times have changed. Sure them Protestant farmers took millions for farm animals in subsidies; sure what’s the problem with a few dogs from the ‘Island getting DLA”

A spokesperson from the Dept of Communities added

“We will get that sorted after the next election in May or, if not, the one in September.”

A few final words on the scandal came from Cookstown:

“Sure all the dogs wear tricolor ribbons tied firmly to their chests and it wouldn’t be surprising if there is another ‘Rising’,”

Dublin, who extended their unbeaten run to 30 games after a win over Cavan in the Allianz League opener, are said to be spooked at the news that Owen Mulligan may return to face the champions on Saturday night in Croke Park.

Mulligan, who has reportedly shed 3 stone by running up and down Cookstown Main Street during the middle of the night, memorably tortured the capital’s team in 2005 over two games including a goal which some describe the greatest they’ve seen in the famed headquarter turf. His 1-7 in the replay cemented the Cookstown man as Dublin’s nemesis that year.

A Dublin backroom member told a reporter this evening:

“This is a spanner in the works. We know we can handle this current Tyrone crop but Mulligan is a different species altogether. Paddy Christie told me recently he still wakes up in cold sweats about that goal. Coman Goggins took to sleepwalking straight after that game. And if Mugsy has shed three stone he’ll be hungry.”

Dublin’s 30-game unbeaten record in league and championship, going right back to March 1st, 2015, sees them as odds-on favourites for Saturday night’s clash despite Mulligan’s imminent arrival. Taking advantage of the bookie’s odds of 2/1, dozens of Cookstown punters have lumped on Tyrone due to their hero’s physical conditioning. Close friend and chronic gambler John Datsun explained:

“It’s like Rocky 4. Owen is going to kick that big Russian’s arse, or Jack McCaffrey as we know him as in Ireland. You should see Mugsy carrying in 6 kegs at the one time into the bar. He’s a pure beast right now and he hasn’t eaten in weeks. He’s gonna ate the leg clean off Michael Darragh MacAuley.”

Mulligan is also reportedly sporting a new look which will remain under wraps until he runs out onto the pitch, if this story is true at all.

Darren McCurry is apparently unhappy at the prospect of being benched in favour of the former All-Star, with the Edendork sharpshooter cryptically tweeting ‘what a load of bollocks #nevergoback #yourepastit #sticktopullinpints’

Neighbours and friends of the Sheehan family in Cookstown have rallied around them in support of their target to eat everything in the house before Monday 9th.

Malachy Sheehan (47), who reportedly took a head stagger at the weekend and demanded that from the start of school onwards there’ll be a family health-kick in the house, has already consumed NINE packets of Pringles, three selection boxes and over 5kg of pistachio nuts in two days. His wife managed to polish off a 12-pack of McCoys as well as FOURTEEN bottles of Shloer during a 12-hour period today.

Speaking from the bins at the side of his house, Mr Sheehan explained his decision:

“We’re slowly turning into small hippopotamuses. If we spread this food out over the next month we’ll never get back on track so I’ve set a target for all Christmas food to be eaten by next Monday. January is miserable anyway so why not make it even more miserable; you won’t notice.”

Sheehan’s eldest son, Malachy (14), has attempted a level of creativity inspired by his love of cookery problems by mixing up his cereal with full Milky Way bars and adding a side order of shortbread and cream crackers to the family dinner plates.

An anonymous neighbour, however, has lambasted the Sheehans for not donating the food to people in places like Kildress and Tullyhogue.

“They’re a miserable shower. Instead of throwing a few scraps to the poor people of Kildress they’re attempting to devour their unwanted food out of sheer wretchedness. I hope they get the runs.”

Tomorrow the Sheehans will be aiming to make a hole in over 15lbs of fudge.

Creative talent in the village of Donaghmore is never far away. The production team based in the legendary Bardic Theatre have created an exciting new TV show about a virtual reality tourist destination set across an ‘olde tyme’ Mid Ulster landscape filled with cowboys, battery hens and Limousin heifers. The target market is the well-off affluent residents of Donaghmore.

If you’re wondering what all the Mannequin Challenges have come from that have swept the globe, it has been all down to director Manny Quinn:

“After a rehearsal up in the theatre in the middle of printing up all the scripts for the cast to practice over the Christmas break I heard a wile racket. I soon realised they were still there bopping about to remixes of Malachi Cush hits so I had to challenge this kind of behaviour- I just lost my cool and shouted at them to howl their whisht. My artistic temperament gets the better of me I suppose.”

We spoke to one of the stars of the show, Gemma O’Neill, who shared that the noise of the gulder from their director scared them stiff and they froze on the spot. A brave cameraman caught the tail end of the incident on video. The video has gone on to huge viral success with many people paying tribute by filming themselves being still and holding their whisht.

Awareness of the new show has since gained huge momentum and anticipation for the pilot episode early next year. Early trailers released exclusively to Tyrone Tribulations show exciting storylines about chasing poitín peddling bandits across the Pomeroy hills as well as the challenge of parking a stagecoach during a busy Cookstown main street on a Saturday morning market.

Freddy Jenkins, a 56-year-old MLA from Cookstown, was first to call a conference this morning in which he revealed a rash of previously-held misconceptions only recently rectified:

Trevor Clarke has opened the floodgates. He’s a brave, brave man. I only learned last night that the earth isn’t actually flat. To be fair I was always suspicious of that anyway as I can see the Sperrins from here. The maddest one is that smoking isn’t that great for you. I thought it cured everything. If one of my children was unwell, I’d have given him a bottle of Lucozade and a 10-pack of Benson’s.

Marge Lynah, a DUP councillor in Strabane, was equally astounded after she cleared up a few of her long-held concrete views by asking around the town yesterday:

So you CAN get pregnant standing up. That’s news to me. And leeches don’t cure everything, they’re now saying! What a relief that is. I was finding them hard to get anyway to cure my asthma.

Despite the above, over 88% of DUP still believe the universe was formed ‘some time between 600 and 3000 years ago’ and that dinosaur bones etc are just planted here and there by atheists messing about.